Amateur vintners win at OC Fair

David Weigand at home with his award winning wines Tuesday July 16 in North Tustin. On the left is Weigand's 2012 Cabernet Franc, which won Double Gold this year at the OC Fair's Home Wine Competition.STUART PALLEY, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Free fair tickets

Fairgoers who bring five cans of food each can get in for free from noon to 4 p.m. instead of paying the $11 general entry price. They'll also get a free pass for a carnival ride.

To get the deal, visitors have to bring the donation in person and are limited to one free entry each. The donations will be accepted at the blue main gate, green gate off Fairview Road and yellow gate off South Newport Boulevard only, and not at Gate 5 off of Arlington Drive.

The OC Fair will have a different donation promotion every Wednesday during the run of the fair. Upcoming free entry promotions will be held for donations of children's books, clothes and school supplies.

Learn how to create your own homemade wine

During the fair, free workshops will be held at 1 p.m. each Saturday through Aug. 10 in the Courtyard close to Centennial Farms. Seating is limited, so call the Courtyard at 714-708-1639 to reserve a spot.

Orange County won't ever be another Napa Valley. But when it comes to homemade wine, amateur local winemakers are going toe-to-toe – in many cases successfully – with their counterparts from across the state.

At the OC Fair's homemade wine competition, the state's largest, roughly 40 locals from 17 of the county's cities took home medals, besting Northern California foes.

The bragging rights are nice, said winemaker Dave Wiegand, who won six medals for the cabernet francs and sauvignons he created in his North Tustin basement. But at the end of the day, "it's about making something you like to drink."

That's one of the reasons Wiegand got into the popular craft, which has amateurs from Mission Viejo to Irvine to Costa Mesa turning their kitchens, spare bedrooms and basements into miniature wineries.

Most leave the grape-stomping to the pros and focus on turning pre-mashed grapes into something drinkable. Some, like Yorba Linda resident Kevin Donnelly, go all-out. He built an air-conditioned 8-by-12 building in his backyard where he concocts up to 400 bottles a year.

What he doesn't drink, Donnelly shares with friends. "It's made me popular at parties," he quipped.

Home-based winemaking has been around for thousands of years, since early man discovered crushing grapes makes something pretty tasty to drink. In the 1970s, state legislators started putting laws on the books to regulate the hobby and bar amateurs from selling their concoctions, explained Paul Kronenberg, president of the Family Winemakers of California.

Around the same time, the first homemade wine competitions cropped up at the fair. Today, entrants submit all kinds of wine – from chardonnay to more exotic libations like toasted caramel port.

They're rated by a panel of judges in a blind tasting on factors including clarity, color, body, balance and bouquet.

Though the competition is dwarfed by the fair's larger commercial wine competition, which draws more than 2,500 entries, it's still a big deal to wine buffs like Wiegand.

A retiree and longtime wine drinker, he visited several wine-growing areas, including France's Bordeaux region, before dipping a toe into amateur winemaking.

"I figured the best way to learn about wine would be to make some," he said.

He got a primer in all the steps and learned a lot of new lingo by joining the Orange County Wine Society, a nonprofit club that coached him along the way.

He gets all his grapes, which run between $1.50 and $3 per pound, trucked down from Sonoma County. Then, he spends about a year or so putting them through fermentation processes, which start in a 33-gallon trash can and end in a 5-gallon glass jug called a "carboy." Over time, about 200 pounds of mashed grapes turns into about two cases of wine.

You could say Wiegand, who started making wine at home two years ago, is a quick study.

The first year he entered the fair competition, he took home a Double Gold medal.

David Weigand at home with his award winning wines Tuesday July 16 in North Tustin. On the left is Weigand's 2012 Cabernet Franc, which won Double Gold this year at the OC Fair's Home Wine Competition. STUART PALLEY, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
White wine is poured at the OC Fair Friday evening during a tasting. STUART PALLEY, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Bottles of award winning homemade wine on display at the OC Fair. STUART PALLEY, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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